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Friday, January 9, 2015

Charlie Hebdo: Religious extremism and fascism.

I was going to comment myself today on the Paris events but this is not a simple issue for me. I looked at some of the cartoons. One of them depicts the prophet Mohammad on his knees in a bathroom being sodomized. Myself and others on this blog have mercilessly attacked the Catholic Church as an institution including using images like the one on the right, but I would never consider including such an image as Jesus being sodomized in a toilet.

This certainly isn't political satire because most workers would be appalled, it would not help socialists draw people to our ideas. Some of the best fighters in my struggles in the union and workplace were Christians, they accept and give me the right to have the positions I have on religion including theirs. I checked out a couple of the Charlie Hebdo cartoons on FB here.

This doesn't mean that we can't attack religious institutions for their support of imperialism, racism, misogyny and reaction. And it in no way condones the response we saw in Paris. The Paris attack must be unconditionally condemned.

In the light of the brutal attack I am sharing our friend and colleague, Farooq' Tariq's comments that followed the attacks on the school in Pakistan last month, Muslims murdering Muslim children. Him and comrades like him have to deal with these forces every day. The attack in Paris hurts all workers and will no doubt increase attacks on Muslims, it will as John Throne said in an earlier blog, strengthen the French state. Israel's Netenyahu, himself a racist and terrorist is using it to boost the Zionist regime's sagging popularity. And we must not lose sight of the fact that the US, in particular the CIA, supported, encouraged and financed the growth of Islamic religious extremism.

It was the most deadly attack on any school by
religious fanatics. 146 were killed in a Peshawar Army Public School, including
136 children, ages ranging from 10 to 17 years. They asked the children to
recite Kalma and then fired at them. It was an attack on Muslim children by
Muslim fanatics.

Tehreek Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility and
sent a group photo of the seven militants who took part in the “operation” holding
guns and bombs. This was in response to the posting on-line of the dead faces
of the seven who were killed by the army in the counter attack, not before they
caused maximum damage.

The fanatics claimed that they do not kill little
children. Their claim was that the children of the “enemy” aged less than 12
are not allowed to be killed by their “Islam”. Almost 11 percent of the total
children enrolled in the school were killed within 15 minutes of their
occupation of the school.

The principal of the school was fired on to the
extent that her body was not recognizable. Her fault: she guided children to
escape from the school during the attack. Children were asked to line up and
then were shot. Those who dared to run were chased and shot also.

Such was the devastating effect on children across
Pakistan that my son aged 14 asked his mum what should he do in case they come
to his school, “line up or run”.

The day shocked Pakistan and the world. The news of
the killing of the innocent children was flashed all over the world as the main
story of the day. There was a great anger and shock.

A spontaneous general strike in all parts of
Pakistan was observed on 17th December a day later, not called by
any political party, a dream of all the parties of the rich that they could be
in a position to shut Pakistan for their own narrow political interests.

This
was one of the most successful strikes with no transport on the roads and
almost all shops and institutions were closed. This reminded us of the
aftermath of Benazhir Bhutto’s killing in December 2007, when all of Pakistan
was shut in grief and anger.

A two minute silence in all the schools in India, a
so-called arch rival, was observed, with the Indian parliament passing a
resolution condemning the attack.

On the same day, heads of all the political parties
represented in the parliament met in Peshawar for a useless day agreeing to
“work together” with no mind-set change and no concrete proposal for dealing
with fanatics. How could they?

In the meeting was Imran Khan whose party is in
power in Khaiber Pukhtonkhawa, where the incident took place. He was too busy
in campaigning for the overthrow of the federal government with his sit-ins and
rallies in other parts of the country while totally ignoring the task of
securing lives in the province.

Imran Khan’s philosophy of “good and bad Taliban”
meant that no action was taken against the fanatics who had built safe heavens
in the tribal areas. He was a strong advocate of “talks with good Taliban” to
divide the fanatics. There are no good or bad Taliban. They are all in the same
family of neo-fascism.

The ruling Muslim League had long term contacts with
most of the religious fanatic groups and used them to win the 2013 general
elections. Fanatics carried out suicide attacks on most of the opponents of
PMLN and PTI, thus preventing them from running effective election campaigns.

Sitting in the meeting was Jamaat Islami, whose
former head, declared dead Taliban as Shaheed (martyr) and army men killed by
fanatics as dead. There was also Jamiat Ulemai Islam, the known political wing
of one section of the religious fanatics. Also several other political parties
who maintain regular contacts and links with religious extremists groups for
their narrow political interests and subscribe to the same millenarian ideology
of the Jihadists.

The meeting agreed to form a committee to formulate
the security policy for the state within a week, as in one week they could come
up with any magic formula.

The Pakistani state failed miserably to curb the
rise of religious fundamentalism. There is always a soft spot for them. For a long
time, they were encouraged by the state as a second line of security. The
security paradigm meant an anti-India enmity was the core purpose of state
patronage. The process of Islamisation was accelerated by military Dictator Zia
Ul Haq with the full support of American imperialism.

Apart from creating and supporting Jihadist groups,
for decades the state and military with the financial and political assistance
of imperial powers, has indoctrinated millions with conservative Islamic
ideology for the purpose of safeguarding its strategic interests.

The three decades since 1980 are seen as the years
of madrassas, over 20,000 at present providing home ground for recruitment for
suicidal attackers. Supported mainly by Saudi Arabia and many million Muslim
immigrants, they have become the alternative to the regular school system. Most
of the terrorist activities carried out in Pakistan and elsewhere are linked to
the organizational and political support of these madrassas.

After 9/11, the state’s close relationship with the
fundamentalists has changed to some extent but not broken in real terms. The
banned terrorist groups change their name and carry out activities on a regular
basis. They hold meetings and public rallies, collect funds and publish their
literature without any state intervention.

Pakistan has become more conservative, more Islamic
and more right wing resulting in the growth of the extreme Islamist’s ideas.
Blasphemy laws are frequently used for settling personal and ideological
scores. Religious minorities, women and children are the easy targets. These
soft targets are paying the greatest price for this decisive right wing turn.

The rise of religious fundamentalism has emerged as the
most serious challenge not only to progressive forces but also to the very
foundation of a modern society. Education and health are the real targets of
the fanatics.

Polio workers, mainly women, are killed by fanatics,
on the assumption that a team working for the elimination of polio led to the
discovery of Osama Bin Ladin, leading to his assassination. The net result is that the World Health
Organization has recommended a ban on all Pakistanis traveling abroad without a
polio vaccination certificate.

The primary and high school syllabus in Punjab and
Khaiber Pukhonkhawa provinces are amended to give room to more unscientific and
pro-Jihad ideas in the name of religion. Education in most schools has been
littered with war-promoting philosophy.

Religious fanatics groups are the new version of
fascism. They are fascists in the making. They have all the historic
characteristics of fascism. They kill opponents en mass. They have found
considerable space among the middle class, particularly educated ones. They are
against trade unions and social movements. They are promoting women as inferior
to men, and aim to keep them in the home. Attacking the religious minorities
has become a norm.

The religious fanatic groups are internationalists.
They want an Islamic world. They are against democracy and promote Khilafat (kingdom)
as a way of governance. They are the most barbaric force recent history has
seen in the shape of “Islamic State” and Taliban. There is nothing progressive
in their ideology. They are not anti-imperialism but anti-America and anti-West.
They have created and carried out the most barbaric terrorist activities in the
shape of suicide attacks, bomb blasts, mass killings and indiscriminate
shootings.

They must be countered. The American way of fighting
back in shape of “war on terror” has failed miserably. Despite all the American
initiatives of occupations, wars and creating democratic alternatives, the
religious fundamentalists have grown with more force. Fundamentalists are
stronger than they were at 9/11, despite the occupation of Afghanistan.

A whole package is needed. The state must break all
links with fanatic’s groups. The mindset that religious fundamentalists are
“our own brothers, our own people, our security line and guarantee against
“Hindus”, some are bad and some are good” and so on must
be changed. The conspiracy theories are most favorable arguments among the
religious right wingers. They do not want to face the reality.

There is no short cut to end religious
fundamentalism. There is no military solution. It has to be a political fight
with dramatic reforms in education, health and working realities in most Muslim
countries. Starting from nationalization of madrassas, it must go on to provide
free education, health and transport as one of most effective means to counter
fundamentalism.

Right wing ideas are promoting extreme right wing
ideology. A mass working class alternative in the shape of trade unions and
political parties linked with social movements is the most effective manner to
counter religious fundamentalism.